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Reid Goldsborough

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Everything posted by Reid Goldsborough

  1. It's not clear if you're suggesting that people take a chisel to a coin to learn about test cuts. I'd suggest this isn't a good idea, for three reasons. First, doing so with an ancient coin today wouldn't be the same as doing it when the coin was minted, as silver inevitably becomes embrittled over time. Second, doing so with a modern coin would require getting the alloy and thickness right. A 1964 quarter has a lot more copper than most ancient Greek silver coins, and is harder as a result. A silver American Eagle bullion coin is closer, but still much thinner than the vast majority of ancient Greek coins. A modern replica would be closest, provided the alloy was right. Third, test cutting in ancient times was in all likelihood a specialized craft, as was die making and minting. Occasionally somebody writes an article today where he tries to replicate these ancient techniques and then draws conclusions from his efforts. But what's typically ignored is that those who did this in ancient times likely served apprentices before engaging in their craft with hundreds if not thousands of coins. You can't replicate this today unless you do something on a similar scale.
  2. I'm afraid you can't be forgiven for this. It can't be done. Not by me, anyway. But I will say that from the additional information you provide above, about how three of these coins were marked in a similar way, that it sounds like a crude banker's mark, also called a countermark. These markings were made in Owls and other ancient coins primarily for two purposes, to test the integrity of the metal underneath (make sure it was solid all the way through, not plated), and to certify the coin as legal tender in a location other than where it was minted (with very early coins, such as the Lydian trite to the left that I'm using as my avatar here, countermarks are thought to be designations of ownership, with some of these coins today having more than a dozen such marks). Typically, very little metal was lost through this process. The metal, rather than being chipped off, was merely pushed to the sides of the mark. Countermarked coins, like test-cut coins, typically have the same weight as coins not marked in this way. Coins with banker's marks can be quite collectable -- some of the marks themselves can be attractive -- but they typically sell for less than coins not marked. Some people specialized in collecting them.
  3. I believe that coin copies are the numismatic equivalent of devil worship. It doesn't matter what kind of copy, whether ancient counterfeit (fouree), ancient imitation, modern replica, old modern forgery, new modern forgery, whatever, they're all exactly the same. Exactly. They're pure evil, and anyone who even thinks about collecting them should be reported to the International Bureau of Numismatic Standards and Puritanism, which has as its U.N.-chartered purpose the promulgation of what's collectable and what's not. Copies are not collectable, neither are they collectible, and above all else nobody here should ever write that they're collectuble.
  4. I have some material at my site about holed coins, and I have some other material about test cut coins, and I have still other material about banker's marked coins. A hole that goes only halfway through the coin? Michael's site probably has something about this. (You guys asked for it.) I don't remember any previous discussion about this. This may be a result of a hole that goes halfway through my head. My guess would be that this coin was a botched attempt to create a holed coin for the purposes that holed coins served. Test cuts were simple slashes with a blade or chisel. Banker's marks were designed. It alternately could be a crudely designed banker's mark, I suppose.
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